Who Else?
by ChetUnGwan
Summary: M is not for Moriarty. New face, New playground. This one is going to be slow, sorry.
1. Chapter 1

This was not supposed to happen. That was the Doctor's first thought upon seeing the newspaper.

The Master was dead. Again. Or rather, again, again, again and again. But this time it really _was_ supposed to be permanent. And yet, glaring from the paper in his hand was the Master.

Different face again, but the Doctor could tell. Time Lords always could.

The Doctor rifled through the paper, searching for the article that would hopefully shed some light on this conundrum. Finding it, he read through quickly once, and went back to read it again, this time in disbelief.

The Master was called Moriarty? Or was it Brook? He had also supposedly been hired to act out another man's delusions.

The Doctor seriously doubted that the Master was that innocent in the double suicide on the hospital roof.

Closing the paper, the Doctor got up. More likely then not, the Master was still alive and well and plotting some big, dramatic plan.

A pang struck the Doctor and he sat back down. How could he fight the same enemy again? The last two times, he had at least had help. Martha and Jack, and then Wilfred. Now, he was alone, and having to fight the same person that he indirectly lost his last incarnation to.

_At least,_ he thought, _I'll have the element of surprise._

* * *

Sherlock was trying to find a way to distract himself without shooting a wall when the computer beeped at him. For a moment, he considered shooting _it_, but he decided that it would still make just as much noise, if not more, and would still blow his cover.

Sighing loudly, he leaned over and clicked the icon. A video from one of the street cameras that he was monitoring for suspicious activity was pulled up.

On it, a blue police box was appearing in an alley. Leaving aside the fact that police boxes hadn't been used for decades, it was just _appearing_ from thin air on the screen.

It took Sherlock almost a full second to digest this. Then he received another shock as a man stepped out of the box, before turning to lock it behind him.

This new man defied all the rules that Sherlock operated on.

For one, he bore no signs that he had been in such a small place for any length of time. For another, he was _no one_. He wasn't police, though he had seen violence. He wasn't a teacher or a counselor, though he liked people. He didn't belong to a college, though he appeared to be rather smart.

What's more, he was wearing a _bow tie_. _No one_ wore bowties casually.

Of course all of this rather paled in comparison to the fact that the box that he had come out of had just appeared out of thin air.

Sherlock smiled for the first time in weeks. This actually looked interesting.

* * *

The Doctor locked his TARDIS behind him as he stepped out onto a rundown London street.

Flipping his sonic screwdriver, he started down the street, scanning it for anyone who might be watching him.

Normally he wouldn't care, but the Master probably had people out looking for anybody especially odd. It wouldn't do to loose his only advantage, his new face, so quickly. The Master might recognize him on sight, but the Doctor wouldn't match any descriptions that his people would have.

The first order of business was to find out who exactly the Master was, here. Depending on that, the Doctor might be able to figure out what the Master's plan was.

He tucked his screwdriver into his pocket and looked around for a sign. This library would be the best place to begin.

Spotting a street sign, the Doctor walked over, and nodded to himself. Now that he knew where he was, he started off down the street, heading for the nearest library.

Suddenly, a hand gripped his shoulder and pulled him into a doorway. He spun around to face his attacker.

* * *

Sherlock watched the strange man, jumping from camera to camera, tracking him.

Once the man found a street sign and started on his actual route, Sherlock raced down the stairs, down a few fire escapes, and positioned himself in a doorway, hidden from view.

Standing there, he waited for the man to pass him. He got closer and closer, still looking so _impossible_.

Then, as he passed Sherlock's doorway, Sherlock reached out and grabbed him. The man spun around, waving his arms in a decidedly ineffective manner.

"Oi! Who are you?"

"A more important question," Sherlock replied, "Is who or what are you?"

"I'm the Doctor, and why is your question more important? Oh! I've seen you before."

This last bit made Sherlock startle slightly. His usual disguise was firmly in place, but he took a moment to be certain. Hair dyed, check. Glasses in place, check. A tourist's outfit, check. Not to mention the change in facial expression and physical demeanor that so often fooled people.

"I'm fairly sure that you haven't." Sherlock said forcefully. However, tone went right over this peculiar man's head.

"No, no. I've seen you just recently somewhere. Not in person, maybe a picture?"

"I really don't know what you-"

"Oh! I've got it! You're that bloke who's supposed to be dead! Oh, that's perfect! Since the Master is behind all those stories, I assume that they're lies, so that means that you're clever, too! I could use your help."

"How did you recognize me?!" Sherlock hissed, slightly panicked, "And who is this Master? Moriarty made up those stories."

"I'm brilliant, that's how. And the name that the Master is using is Moriarty, I suppose. Bit pathetic, really, that's him for you. Could never think up a normal name. Like John Smith, I like using that name-"

"What do you mean, using the name Moriarty? Who are you?"

"I told you, I'm the Doctor."

"You do realize that you are being as evasive as possible?"

"Really? Well, anyways, come with me. I'm going to need help."

Sherlock stepped in front of this infuriating man as he started to leave. "Listen," he hissed, "I don't understand you, and believe me when I say that that is rare. I will not let you tell anyone that I am alive, even to the extent of killing you, though I would really prefer not to. Now. _Explain what you mean_."

The man – the Doctor – turned back to look at him. In that moment, Sherlock understood just a little bit more about this stranger from nowhere. He had a soldier's eyes, eyes that had seen death. Then the Doctor blinked, and covered the hint at his past with a solid layer of cheerful goofyness.

"I hope that you don't really mean that comment about killing me. It wouldn't go over very well." Despite his smile, his tone took on a serious edge. "Now, I would be glad to explain a few things to you. Is there anywhere nearby to sit down?"

Sherlock looked over the Doctor a final time. He was a mystery, but he didn't seem overly dangerous.

"This way."

* * *

The Doctor knew that Sherlock was definitely different. For one, his disguise was genius. Almost perfect. It had only been a brief slip of concentration that had alerted the Doctor to the disguise.

And if that stories that the Master had passed off were complete lies, then Sherlock was truly brilliant. Smart enough successfully fake his death, and smart enough to stay dead.

Now, following him to where ever he was hiding out, The Doctor only hoped that Sherlock was smart enough to accept help.


	2. Chapter 2

Sherlock was wondering just how someone so clearly mad could possibly help him.

This stranger's eccentricities were startling to behold. Now up close, Sherlock could identify crumbs that appeared to be fish fingers and custard, most likely eaten as a kind of comfort food. This in itself was an odd choice of food. In addition, Sherlock could only imagine what had depressed this man, who apparently had seen a good deal of pain and death on a regular basis.

Wondering what has possessed him to take a stranger to his safe house, Sherlock led the Doctor up the stairs and unlocked his door, standing aside to let the Doctor enter.

"Oh! This is brilliant!" he exclaimed, seeming to genuinely mean it, too. He pulled the pen shaped device that he had been holding earlier out of his pocket, and began waving it at Sherlock's computers.

"What are you doin– Careful!" Sherlock barked out the last part as the Doctor almost knocked over one of the screens with a particularly enthusiastic wave.

"Oh, I am sorry."

Sherlock appeared the seethe as he straightened the monitor. "Now. I believe that you were going to explain?"

"Ah! Yes, right. Eh…" The Doctor looked around uncertainly. "Could I sit down?"

Briefly, Sherlock considered telling him no, but he knew that it would be petty and beneath him, and would only serve to annihilate him from the Doctor and any help he could provide. He sighed, "Here," and pulled out the chair from the desk.

The Doctor smiled broadly and settled down with the enthusiasm of a five-year-old. "Thank you! Now, um, right! Explanations. Well. Um…"

"Are you going to speak, or just waste my time?" Sherlock snapped.

"Calm down! I'm going to speak. I'm just not _quite_ sure of how to go about this. Oh well, might as well start with the basics. I'm an alien, the Master – sorry, Moriarty – is an alien, we're enemies – sort of – and he's insane and likes power and is likely alive right now and planning some sort of giant, take-over-the-world kind of plan. I think that that about covers it."

Sherlock blinked. "Ah."

Frowning, the Doctor said, "You don't seem very surprised. Normally, people don't believe me, or they do and they panic."

Sherlock replied, "I already noticed that you have a double pulse, and an extraterrestrial is one of the better explanations for that and a few other discrepancies that I saw. It certainly makes more sense than a random mutation resulting in a functioning binary heart system, setting aside the fact that such a mutation would have made the papers. I will admit that Moriarty being an alien is harder to swallow, but I suppose that he had more time to cover up most evidence. That you are enemies comes as no surprise, and I already knew that he was insane and likely to be alive."

It was the Doctor's turn to blink. "You saw my pulse? Really? That's quite clever."

"One question, though. Are you and Moriarty the same species?"

"Yes, yes we are. Time Lords, we're called."

There was a bit of a pause.

"Well?" Sherlock asked.

The Doctor looked bewildered. "Well what?"

"Do you naturally look so similar to humans? Did you alter yourself to blend in? What makes you different, aside from the double heart? Why are you, an alien, here? What are the other Time Lords like, generally speaking? Describe your world to me. _I want to know_."

The Doctor's eyes gained a distant look. "Time Lords come from the planet Gallifrey, in the constellation Kasterborous. It's lovely there, with deep red grass, and silver-leafed trees. The sky was a burnt orange at night, and it casted an amber tint on everything, like fire." He stared into the distance for a moment, and then shook himself. "But you were asking about other things, too. What were they again?"

Sherlock looked at the Doctor. He could tell that there were issues surrounding the Doctor's home world, beginning with the use of past tense when he talked about it. He also spoke as if he was trying to romanticize it his mind. Treading more carefully with his questions now, Sherlock asked, "Why are you here?"

The Doctor's wistful smile faded a bit. "I recently… ah … lost some friends. So I wandered over here to look around. You know, see if any adventures pop up. I didn't expect to find the Master!"

"Wandered over here in a teleporting police box."

"It's a TARDIS! My TARDIS."

"An anachronism, I suppose. What does it stand for?"

"Time And Relative Dimension In Space."

"Time? What do you mean by that?"

"It can travel through time as well as space."

Sherlock stared. "That's impossible. Time travel isn't realistic. Theoretically possible, perhaps, but still completely unrealistic."

The Doctor's smile returned in full force. "Of course it's possible. I'm here, aren't I?"

Tightening his lips, Sherlock remembered how the box had appeared from seemingly nowhere, and forced himself to admit that it was possible that the Doctor's culture had advanced enough to manipulate physics. Unlikely, to be sure, but possible.

"Fine. I accept that your police box can travel through time. Now. Knowing that Moriarty is alive changes my plans significantly. Previously, I was hunting down his contacts and disabling his criminal empire. I suspect that Moriarty takes exception to this."

Most likely," the Doctor nodded.

"In that case, before I continue destroying his network, I'll have to kill him."

"Wait, you're just going to kill him?" the Doctor exclaimed, his brow furrowing.

"What else can I really do? With his contacts, he won't even be convicted. He's done it before. He let himself be arrested, and then blackmailed the jury into letting him walk free."

"But you can't just -"

Sherlock slammed the table with his fist, almost knocking over the screens again. "There is no other option! He can break out of anything, it's not safe for him to be alive!"

The Doctor looked at him sadly, then said hesitantly, " I could take him. You won't ever have to deal with him again."

"What do you mean?"

"All of time and space, remember? You don't need to kill him."

Sherlock frowned. "Are you sure? You won't ever bring him back? Not now or in the future?"

The Doctor nodded. "Absolutely. Cross my hearts."

"Very well then. We need to capture him now. You wouldn't happen to know where he is?"

"Not a clue." The Doctor grinned. "But I can try to figure it out."


	3. Chapter 3

A few hours later, the Doctor still hadn't gotten anywhere. Sherlock had long since retired to his mind palace, leaving the Doctor to manipulate the computers with his sonic screwdriver. While doing so, the Doctor had accidently spammed NATO with cruise ads, and sent a letter describing a tree in exquisite detail to the Queen. However, he still hadn't found any sign of the Master.

He gritted his teeth, frustrated. He had started with what Sherlock had hacked of the criminal network, but a huge chunk of the data was deadlocked. Only someone familiar with sonic technology could have done that.

Someone like the Master.

Or maybe Torchwood, but that wasn't really likely anymore, what with most of them being dead.

So probably the Master.

Which meant that the data was likely to be important and might lead them straight to the Master. The only problem was that _it was deadlocked_, and the sonic screwdriver wasn't working on it. The Doctor groaned aloud.

"Problem?" Sherlock asked.

"A bit. This bit of information is deadlocked. That means that sonic doesn't work on it. Also, it's encrypted as well, and I can't un– What are you doing?"

Sherlock had reached across the Doctor and began pressing keys. Suddenly, the screen cleared and words began scrolling down it.

"What did you do?"

Sherlock shrugged. "You had uncovered a few crucial pieces of information when you were waving around your buzzing wand thing. With those, I was able to solve the encryption that had eluded me before."

"It's a sonic screwdriver, and- oh!" The Doctor cut himself off as he stared at the screen.

Sherlock looked over. "What?"

"It's - it's this." He pointed.

Sherlock frowned. "I don't understand. It appears to be a list of titles. Are they yours?"

"No. Not mine." The Doctor was pale.

On the screen, the list read:

Bad Wolf

The One Who Walked the Earth

The Most Important

The Girl Who Waited

The Last Centurion

"I don't understand," Sherlock repeated, "Who is this?"

"They. It's not one person."

Sherlock sighed, gritting his teeth. "Alright then. Who are they?"

The Doctor got up suddenly and began pacing. As he paced, he muttered. "Could he…? No. Impossible. Rose isn't even… Couldn't have. But then why…? And what about Amy, no, impossible."

"Doctor! Explain!" Sherlock shouted.

The Doctor looked up from his hands. "What?"

"Tell. Me. Who. They. Are." Sherlock ground out each word, angry at the information.

For a second, the Doctor hesitated. Then, "They're my friends. My companions. They're who I used to travel with. But they're all gone now. Some left, and some were separated, and some just couldn't come anymore. So now they're gone. But that list shouldn't be there! The Master could _maybe_ know about Rose, and he definitely knows about Martha, and he probably knows about Donna, but the last time I saw him, I hadn't even met Amy and Rory yet! It isn't possible!"

Sherlock sat through the rant impassively, absorbing as much information as possible. "Doctor, which title goes with which person?"

The Doctor, a bit drained from his outburst, sat down in the desk chair again and slowly said, "Bad Wolf is Rose. She gained some power briefly, and that was the message she used then. The One Who Walked the Earth is Martha. She helped me defeat the Master the last time, by traveling the world. The Most Important, well, that one is Donna. She doesn't remember me now. I had to wipe her mind in order to keep her safe. The Girl Who Waited is Amy. She and Rory, the Last Centurion, are married. Those were only the latest friends. The others… again, things happened and they were gone." He fell silent, staring into space and looking so very _sad_.

This time Sherlock hesitated. Again, he could tell that he was treading dangerous ground. Briefly, he wondered just how much of the Doctor's past was touchy. So far, all of it had some kind of emotional trigger. Still, this was important. Moriarty was connected to it.

"Why would he have placed those titles under such severe encryption? Are the titles a secret?"

The Doctor frowned again. "No, not really. I mean, it's not well known of anything, but it's definitely not a secret. Wait, let me see that encryption again."

He pulled the screen and keyboard to him and began typing slowly while scanning the screen.

"Ah!" He highlighted a section of code and expanded it to fill the screen. "I must have been really quite out of it before, I don't know how I missed it."

Sherlock, beginning to resign himself to having to having to specifically ask for explanations, asked, "What?"

"This." The Doctor grimaced, "This is basically a loophole for the entire encryption. You solved it, but if I had noticed this, it would have been much easier."

"Then why didn't I notice it?"

"Because it's in Gallifreyian. You can't even read it, much less understand how to us it."

"So Mori- the Master wanted you to be able to find that?" Sherlock asked, trying to steer the Doctor along.

"Yes, so-" Suddenly the Doctor looked worried. "Oh. That might mean- no. Rose- he couldn't have gotten-"

"Doctor…" Sherlock said tiredly.

"Right, it might mean that he has captured, but that would be really hard, seeing that Rose is in a different universe right now."

Sherlock almost questioned this, but decided to lump this with the TARDIS under "Have Him Prove it Later." He shook his head and tried to get the Doctor closer to deciding a course of action.

"I take it, then, that you will want to find out if they're safe, correct?"

"Yes! Definitely."

Sherlock gritted his teeth. This was straying from his goal. All he wanted right now was get rid of Moriarty and his network so he could go back to John and clear his name. But now Moriarty was playing a game, and it involved this mystery man, the Doctor. Sherlock sighed. He couldn't back down.

"Let me see the screen."

Sherlock scrolled to the bottom and highlighted a chunk of text.

"What's this?" he asked.

The Doctor frowned at the screen. "It's Gallifeyian, a location… it's in London!"

Sherlock stood up and began to pace. "This is obviously a trap. We'll need to start there, but we can't afford to wander straight in. The best thing to do is keep our distance while gathering information. I'll have to find this location on a map and begin planning out our approach."

The Doctor nodded, and then said, "Let's go right in."

Sherlock turned around to look at him, incredulous. "Did you even hear me?!"

"Of course I heard you. You want to sneak around and wait. That's boring! There's no fun there."

"This isn't supposed to be _fun_." Sherlock snarled.

The Doctor regarded him with an unfamiliar look. Isn't it? What do you do then, then, if you don't have any fun? What is it like, being you?"

Sherlock was jolted slightly by the familiarity of the words. It was true; in the past he had done almost everything in order to stave off boredom. He had _had_ to, in order to stay sane. This time, though, he actually had an outside goal in mind. Still… Sherlock was reasonably confident that he could think his way out of the trap. And it would be much more entertaining to see how the Doctor handled it.

"Very well. We'll do it your way."


End file.
